Daily Signal

Congressional Democrats and Republicans agree that Big Tech companies are too powerful, says a Texas congressman who is a leader on the issue.

“These Big Tech companies have gotten to the point that they own the government, in a sense,” Rep. Lance Gooden, co-chair and co-founder of the Freedom From Big Tech Caucus, says, adding that “people are tired of being censored, of being policed, by Big Tech.”

With many Democrats agreeing that Congress should place some limits on the power of Big Tech platforms, the Biden administration has called on these companies to stop the spread of "misinformation" or "disinformation."

During an interview with Axios on climate change, White House national climate adviser Gina McCarthy said that “tech companies have to stop allowing specific individuals over and over again to spread disinformation." 

To fix this problem, the former Environmental Protection Agency administrator said, "we need the tech companies to really jump in."

Gooden joins “The Daily Signal Podcast” to discuss the dangers of Big Tech companies' policing information, and how his Freedom From Big Tech Caucus is working to rein in platforms such as Google and Twitter.

Also on today’s show, we cover these stories:

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Starting with the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic and widespread school closures, parents got a firsthand look at their children's education through virtual instruction—and they didn't always like what they saw happening.

The parental revolt of 2021 toppled Democrat Terry McAuliffe in Virginia's gubernatorial election after he infamously quipped, "I don’t think parents should be telling schools what they should teach."

Frustrated parents propelled Republican Glenn Youngkin to the governor's office in Richmond. Across the country, concerned citizens ran for school boards—and won. And today, parents are rightfully demanding information from their schools.

The Southeastern Legal Foundation is stepping in to help parents. Kimberly Hermann, the organization's general counsel, spoke to The Daily Signal about parental rights and the resources available to them.

Listen to the full interview or read a lightly edited transcript at DailySignal.com.

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California is moving ahead with a bill that would offer gender-transition medical treatment not just to in-state children, but also to kids across America. 

If passed, California’s "Trans Refuge Bill" would allow young people from other states to visit California to receive sex hormones, puberty blockers, and sex-reassignment surgeries.  

“What's happened is that there are a number of states that have recognized that these medical interventions are incredibly harmful,” says Erin Brewer, the co-founder of Advocates Protecting Children. But California has decided to “open its doors to people who want to access these medical interventions, even though their states have found them to be incredibly dangerous and worth blocking,” she added. 

Brewer is no stranger to the complexities of gender dysphoria, having herself once thought she was a boy as a child after surviving sexual assault. Today, Brewer says she is thankful she did not take medication or have surgeries to alter her body, and hopes more can be done to provide young people struggling with gender dysphoria counseling and other help they need. 

Brewer joins “The Daily Signal Podcast” to discuss California’s transgender children bill, and share her own story of struggling with gender dysphoria. 

Also on today’s show, we also cover these stories:

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In the wake of globalization, the industrial base of the country has been hollowed out. Booming towns throughout the Rust Belt began to hemorrhage residents as jobs dried up and were shipped overseas.

Americans are beginning to seriously question whether the decision to send manufacturing overseas was worth it.

Paige Willey, a former adviser to then-President Donald Trump and host of the “This Is Your Country” podcast, joins the show to discuss how globalism has ravaged America, and what can be done to counter it.

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Few times in American history has the Supreme Court received more attention than in the past two months. 

What will history say about this past Supreme Court term? Will we ever know who leaked the draft majority opinion in the Dobbs case? And how is new Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson going to change the Supreme Court moving forward? 

Heritage Foundation legal experts Zack Smith and GianCarlo Canaparo join “The Daily Signal Podcast” to answer these questions and to preview cases the justices will hear in the fall. 

Also on today’s show, we cover these stories: 

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Back in the day, supposedly conservatives were the ones who cracked down on fun. The common knowledge went that liberals were focused on free expression and free speech, while the right tried to shut things down.

The modern left has abandoned its old principles of free expression, however, and become infamous for scolding Americans on not being 100% politically correct.

Noah Rothman, author of the new book “The Rise of the New Puritans: Fighting Back Against Progressives’ War on Fun,” says this new wave of woke censorship echoes the utopian push by the Puritans of old.

Rothman says the leftist utopia is “a sort of messianic mission” that views anything not directly pushing leftist ideology “as not only worthless, but a threat [and] a menace.”

He continues:

Rothman joins the show to detail the left’s shift from free expression to wokescolding, and how the rest if us can best counter it. 

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Sheriff Roy Boyd of Goliad County, Texas, joined other law enforcement officials from his state last week to raise alarm about the border crisis that’s wreaking havoc in America. These local officials, who confront the consequences daily, are now calling it an “invasion.”

>>> ‘We’re Being Invaded,’ Local Texas Leaders Say as Border Crisis Worsens

Boyd, a seventh-generation Texan, recently spoke to The Daily Signal about what it’s like in Goliad County, the vicious cartels trafficking humans and drugs, and why you the problem of illegal immigration is much worse than anyone realizes.

“This is just a tidal wave of people coming across. It is an invasion. There’s no two ways about it,” Boyd says. “When you, as a taxpayer in the state of Texas, can’t utilize your own property because of the massive wave of people, it is an invasion, and that’s exactly what it is.”

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In this Saturday edition of the Daily Signal Podcast, Mary Theroux discusses her work of trying to improve the plight of the homeless in San Francisco with methods that attempt to heal the problems in their lives that have led them to such a condition.

She notes that the Housing First policy approach that treats the homeless as if they just need housing doesn't work. Theroux observes "this one size fits all policy that the federal government is imposing, does not address the underlying issues. So people may get into housing, but they're still traumatized, they may still be addicted, they may still be suffering for mental illness. And so they'll likely fall out of housing. They're not prepared to live independently. Plus they may be living in an apartment complex with other people who have very serious problems, and it turns out to be a very unpleasant place to live. So they'll leave as the streets are better."

We're going to need better solutions and this conversation highlights many of those.

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Japan’s longest serving prime minister, Shinzo Abe, is dead. Abe’s legacy loomed large over Japan and his untimely death sent shockwaves throughout the country and the world.

But with Abe’s death, questions arise about what direction Japan will go.

Bruce Klingner, a Heritage Foundation Senior Research Fellow specializing in Japanese affairs, joins this bonus episode of “The Daily Signal Podcast” to discuss what the implications are for Japan, and dive into the legacy that Abe leaves behind.

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In the wake of the Supreme Court striking down Roe v. Wade and returning the issue of abortion to the American people and their local elected representatives, a gaggle of leftist district attorneys said they won't enforce laws enacted to protect the unborn.

Some of those rogue district attorneys are from pro-life states and might attempt to stymie efforts by state legislatures to protect life.

Cully Stimson, a senior legal fellow at The Heritage Foundation, is not surprised, and says that those district attorneys have already refused to enforce other laws, against violence and petty crime, among other things. (The Daily Signal is the news outlet of The Heritage Foundation.)

The tactic of not enforcing some of the laws that their state legislatures pass and their governors sign "is not a new play for them," says Stimson. "So, it's not surprising that they're virtue signaling and trying to [capitalize] on the anti-Dobbs hysteria on the left and hold themselves out as defenders of freedom and all the rest of it." (The Supreme Court's June 24 ruling in Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization overturned Roe, the 1973 ruling that legalized abortion nationwide.)

Worse, there's no way to get the anti-abortion laws enforced if the rogue district attorneys decide they won't cooperate.

"Remember, the prosecutor—not the police officer, not the mayor, not the governor—is the gatekeeper to the criminal justice system," explains Stimson. "So, police can arrest people for committing crimes that are on the books, but if the DA says, 'Sorry, Officer Schmuckatelli, we're not going to bring that case and file it in court.' That's the end of the line."

Thankfully, there’s a possible solution. As we've seen even in liberal San Francisco, which recently recalled its leftist prosecutor, Chesa Boudin, the people can take matters into their own hands and recall district attorneys who won't do their jobs.

"Find out from your DA whether they believe in reimagining prosecution and not asking for bail even for repeat criminals, and not fully enforcing the law," recommends Stimson. "Because if they are following [leftist billionaire George Soros'] bought-and-paid-for playbook or inspirational playbook, or the playbook from the Fair and Just Prosecution ... then you're going to know that you're going to have a crime problem in your city."

Stimson joins the show to discuss the implications of district attorneys refusing to prosecute abortion-related crimes, and what Americans can do to hold them accountable. 

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